Peterborough United Women Under 23s suffered a 5-1 defeat to Doncaster Rovers Belles Development at the idverde Training Ground in their final FA Women’s National League Reserves Midlands Division fixture of the season.
A second-half goal from Eve Cragg was not enough for Posh Women Under 23s as they fell to defeat in their final match of the season.
Posh carved out the first opportunity of the game as a free-kick from Jess Abrantes picked out Taya Smith, but her effort was claimed by the goalkeeper.
On 12 minutes, the visitors took the lead through a quick counter attack with Maisie EVERITT finishing past Grace Smith from close range.
Doncaster's lead was doubled on 27 minutes when EVERITT broke away down the left side and took the ball around Smith and calmly slotted the ball into an empty net.
Doncaster added a third less than 60 seconds later as EVERITT was able to complete her hat-trick.
Following the break, Posh were determined to get back into the game and were able to pull one back on 53 minutes thanks to Abrantes' corner finding CRAGG who was able to flick it past the goalkeeper and into the net.
Doncaster scored their fourth goal on 61 minutes with substitute Poppy HAWKINS adding her name to the scoresheet.
The final goal of the match came on 76 minutes as Jessica FRICK finished from close range.
Manager Michael Allsebrook said: “We didn’t really get going to be honest, I thought we played well at the start, we had some decent moments, but fair play to them, I thought they were really good, they were really physical, technically good on the ball and tactically they knew what they were doing.
"For the first 50 minutes of the game, they were just better than us, we changed formation, we tried to see if we could get more width to try and attack their full-backs and it worked to a certain extent but ultimately we’ve made four or five individual errors that have cost us the game which is disappointing.
"I can’t fault the effort of the girls and how hard they tried, we asked at half-time for them to go again and to go and be better and they were slightly better, but ultimately it was a day where we weren’t good enough to get the result.
“I thought when the first goals in then we recover from that, when two and three go in you go, right we’re fighting a losing battle and we’re going to have to score four to go and get a result in the game. We didn’t show enough to go and do that, so we have to cope better in those moments, we spoke at the end to the players about those hard moments, taking responsibility and I think there’s a lesson for some of them to learn on that one. They’re good players but sometimes shy away from that but some of them did step up today.”
Posh: Smith (sub Hollwey 45min), Richards-Reeves (sub Cooper 66min), Abrantes, Riley, Biggadike, Akinyemi, Cragg (sub Cook 71min), Smith, Oliver, Ford, Iyawa.
Half-Time: Peterborough United Women Under 23s 0-3 Doncaster Rovers Belles Development
Full-Time: Peterborough United Women Under 23s 1-5 Doncaster Rovers Belles Development
Photo credit: Keira Thurston
Written by Jake Clipson-Cox